Zero Point
by SotF
Summary: Part of the Speed Freak saga. One of the two sequals to Overdrive. Zero goes to LA after awaking with no memory and gets entangled in problem that could destroy him. COMPLETE
1. New Horizons

AN: This story develops in the Buffy World a short while after Overdrive's last chapter. It concerns only one character from Overdrive, but it does involve a few other Buffyverse characters as it deals with a situation from the show.  
  
A pale blue hedgehog twitched slightly as he began to move. The light slowly drawing him awake. His eyes fluttered open and he scanned the wreckage around him, the computer parts of his being were empty as they reinitialized.  
  
His mind was blank, no memories, no past, no history. A thought bubbled up within him.  
  
"Who am I?"  
  
He crawled to his feet, no answer coming from the rattled recesses of his mind.  
  
Pain shot through his leg and he reached down, spotting an item that his mind identified as a crossbow bolt protruding from the leg, just above his sock.  
  
Without a second thought, he ripped it out and stared at it for a moment before tossing it away as the wound sealed, the nanobots inside of his bloodstream already sealing the damage and healing him, not even leaving a scar as the wound simply shrunk and vanished within thirty seconds.  
  
He tried to find his name, some self identification; one brushed his mind for a mere moment, "Cyber Sonic."  
  
But then it vanished, the name didn't sound right, it was not who he was, his mind searched and compared probabilities from the little information he had, choosing a name that would suit him.  
  
"I am Zero," he whispered, the tag identifying him now firmly in place.  
  
He headed out of town as fast as he could, one of the programs within him left him rather paranoid and the destruction around where he had come to was not something he wished to be connected to.  
  
The only stop that Zero made was to retrieve an interesting object, a sword that carried several streaks of dried blood, stains that matched the blood on his hand that he analyzed and confirmed was not his, the plot thickened.  
  
Zero leaped off the roof of the bus and into the shadows of an alley, he had decided that it was in his best interest to leave town and headed to LA. His first major obstacle was that he didn't look human, so he hitched a ride up top.  
  
His crimson eyes seemed to penetrate the darkness as he moved like a wraith, the stealth programs activating on reflex.  
  
"Well, lookie here," a harsh voice said, and a brief glance from Zero in the direction identified the target as human, "A little snack!"  
  
The identification changed to unknown as the targets face distorted.  
  
It charged, its motions portraying that it was far stronger than it looked.  
  
Zero classified it as hostile one for the moment and lashed out, the flat of the hand to the throat with a blow that would be capable of shattering bricks. The creature hit the far wall, the cybernetics augmented muscles reacting at full strength.  
  
The audible shattering of bones filled the alley as Zero stepped towards the fallen beast, sensors on full, attempting to identify the hostile.  
  
The creature clambered to its feet, something that made Zero step back, his mind reassessing the targets resilience and threat assessment, raising it by one notch.  
  
It lunged at him, and Zero reacted instinctively by leaping vertically, grabbing hold of the bottom rungs of an old fire escape and driving his boots into his enemies face, dropping it again.  
  
The cyborg yanked downwards, dropping the fire escape on his foe, the targets arms were spread wide, expecting to catch the pale blue hedgehog as it dropped, missing the two iron tips that imbedded in the upper arms.  
  
"Pathetic," Zero said to himself as he crouched down, "Identify yourself, what are you."  
  
"I'm Andy, I'm a vampire," the creature said as Zero got a far away look for a moment as his computer part accessed all data that it could find on the subject.  
  
"Why did you attack me," the hedgehog continued with the same monotone voice.  
  
"I drink blood, you're nothing but a meal!" the vampire roared as it freed itself.  
  
"Interest, parameters of further contact with species vampire now defined," Zero said, crimson eyes seeming to grow colder as he stared at the vamp, forcing it back several steps, "Exterminate, with extreme prejudice."  
  
Zero ripped the bottom rung off of the latter as lunged, grasping Andy by the throat and hefting him into the air without the slightest effort before slamming him into the wall. He rammed the metal spike through the creatures heart and bent it to the side, both ends firmly implanted in the wall behind the blood sucker as the hedgehog ripped off a second one.  
  
"Interesting, you are resilient, I'll give you that, tell me how to kill you."  
  
"No," Andy whimpered as Zero trapped his arms to his side with the second bar, each end breaking ribs and bones before its ends sunk into the wall.  
  
"Perhaps my weaponry will work," the hedgehog said after cocking his head to the side for a moment, a red glow developing from the gloved hands.  
  
The blast seemed burned through the head of the vamp, who seemed to crumble to dust in mid scream.  
  
"Interesting," the cyborg hedgehog muttered to himself as he set off once more, no defined goals as to the location he was headed to.  
  
A figure seemed to coalesce from the shadows before him.  
  
"Are you lost?" the figure, revealed as a man as a stray streak of light from a street light reached in.  
  
"Perhaps, I am searching for something."  
  
"Perhaps I can offer you some guidance," the man responded calmly.  
  
Zero thought for a moment as he was handed a card by the man, "I will consider it."  
  
'That's all I ask," the man said, "I'm Ken by the way."  
  
"My current identifier is Zero," the hedgehog responded without emotion.  
  
Ken stepped out of his way as the cyborg set off once more, his scan of the man seeming to open up more questions then answers about the human. 


	2. Breaking And Entering

AN: One comment, Summer Vacation and Zero Point happen simultaneously, one on Xander's earth and one on other ones. I wasn't originally going to do anything more with Cyber Sonic, but then an idea came to me as one of my computers got friend and ended up with a wiped drive, thus Zero came into being in my head. But anyway, on to the story.  
  
Zero smiled to himself slightly as he settled in at the bar he had found, the other inhabitants backing away. The place was called Caritas, and although the wards were supposed to prevent violence, the cyborg managed to use his weaponry on his first night to the point where demons and humans made it a point not to tick him off.  
  
The adventure then ended with fourteen dusted vampires, six Polgara looking for a medic for severe laser burns, and a few others with injuries of lesser varieties, and all without breaking a sweat. All in all, they decided that the hedgehog was someone who if he looked angry, it was better to run for cover because destruction is seconds away.  
  
What made it worse, was they couldn't even fight back inside the bar, outside of it, Zero just took more time and normally left anything that looked at it feeling sick with the slow, cold, and methodical technique he would use to leave demon corpses scattered around. Something in him had told him not to harm humans, but he could bypass that to the extent of not killing.  
  
But he sensed something wrong this night, even the host, Lorne, could feel that something was going on. And with a nervous Zero, the rest of the audience was on their toes as well. Of them all, Lorne was the only one who wasn't afraid of, and Zero had an odd feeling of trust for the green skinned demon.  
  
"So you sense it to?" the host asked the hedgehog.  
  
"Yes, something seems off, and it is not just me, my internal diagnostic revealed nothing different there, so this has to be outside interference of some kind."  
  
"You know, I have something that may just interest you, people have been disappearing in town, runaways mostly, but one of the Brachen families lost their kid to whatever it was," Lorne asked the pale blue creature sitting there.  
  
"Any other information about them?"  
  
"All I know is that its some sort of shelter that links them all, seems like a creepy group, nice yes, but still they give me the heebie jeebies."  
  
"Alright, just erase my tab when I find out what's going on."  
  
"Done," Lorne responded, "The shelter is called Family Home, you could start there."  
  
"I'll look into it, I've already got an invite to visit them, and I seem to have an itchy trigger finger tonight."  
  
"Please don't shoot up my bar again, that cost way more than your tab does now."  
  
Zero smirked as he made his way out of the bar.  
  
"Something tells me that we ought to call the morgue and tell them to order extra bodybags," the bartender whispered as the doors swung shut.  
  
The pale hedgehog dashed along the rooftops, leaping from one to the next with the precision his implants gave him.  
  
He checked the inventory of items in his shoulder harness and removed one item as he landed on the roof of the Family Home runaway shelter. His red eyes flashed around the area, settling upon a skylight and crouched down, to watch for a moment, his eyes glowing like a cats in the gloom as he watched the inside.  
  
His eyes opened wide as he saw a girl being put into a strange thing full of some dark fluid that his sensors couldn't identify. He waited, calculating the time it would take before she would need air, but she didn't come out, and the hedgehog realized that something was very wrong as he drove his foot through the glass and dropped the item he had pulled from the harness.  
  
The flash bang grenade went off inside, his biomechanical systems recovering instantly as he leaped into action, freeing the blade he carried as he fell, his sensors determining that those who put the girl in were not human of origin and thus not protected by his programming.  
  
The hedgehog struck out with the blade like wild fire, a calm grew within him as he moved in fluid strikes, each one guiding him further through the destruction that he was causing with a predatory ease.  
  
The disturbingly sweet smell of blood filled the air as the cyborg demolished those there save for one, the one he recognized.  
  
"Hello Ken," he hissed, blade to the creatures throat as he cocked his head to one side, "I see that you have been a very naughty boy."  
  
"You," the demon managed to say through his rage.  
  
"Yes, as before, I am Zero, and you are going to tell me what happened to the people you've been taking," the cyborg said, the demon taking in the carnage around him, "And if you don't I get to take my time in carving you up like a, what is the phrase, nice Christmas turkey."  
  
"Through the pool, another dimension," it managed to stutter, "Please don't hurt me!"  
  
The cyborg's face remained emotionless as he stared at the creature for a moment before removing his limbs and attaching a grenade to him and shoved him into the pool before taking a swan dive into it himself. 


	3. Fallen Angels

AN: Yes, Zero is a little trigger happy, he's becoming more of a three dimensional character, becoming something more than a program with one goal. He still has some of the cold and heartless parts of Silver Sonic and a particularly vicious streak about a mile wide. Some of the inspiration for Zero comes from the Terminator 2 novel trilogy starting with Infiltrator and the I-950 series cyborg's. Don't worry too much though, he still has a pretty much blank slate as far as his mind is, things just come to him also he has some connection to the internet, not much of one, but enough that he can utilize it. As for his little playtime in Caritas, well, I remember something about weaponry can be utilized outside of it to attack the inside and the violence isn't committed by the organic part of Zero, it's his cybernetic part that handles the fire control situation, meaning he goes terminator if he gets mad enough and eliminates the threat. He's the shoot first, shoot second, shoot last, shoot anything that's still moving and ask a question or two maybe, sort of character.  
  
The cold filled him for an instant, bringing out something buried deep within the core programming of his cybernetic parts; his programming went to a setting that had been implanted in every single one of Robotnik's creations, one designed to aid in rule by terror. His eyes seemed to light up for a moment, burning against the instant darkness before fading back to their normal crimson. The demons didn't know what they had just unleashed upon themselves.  
  
He dropped free, the implanted jets triggered with a deafening whine that tore the air as Zero looked like the angel of death come to kill all who stood in his way. His eyes glowed bright in the dim light, his coloration seeming to make him more dangerous, and the laser bursts he was throwing out, crimson death.  
  
Burning demons cast shadows around him as he surveyed the wreckage caused by Ken when he crash landed with a modified grenade designed between a white phosphorous and an anti personnel one, the blast was not designed to kill, no it was one he had used some of the files he had managed to recover to design, its purpose was to maim and harm, leave them alive but only just.  
  
The place was something that seemed born of nightmares and they did not yet realize that for the demons holding the keys, the destroyer had come, the prisoners saw one come to rescue them. But he was not viewed with light, he was a machine of pure death and destruction, spreading death through the area, moving faster than any human could hope, nor many demons as well.  
  
Zero was a force of nature, awesome and deadly in his element amidst the screams of the demons. He snapped the neck of the first demon to get close to him as he seemed to dance through the fight. His blade hissed through the air as he moved without thought, his mind nearing the zero point, the point where he could sense everything, the one thing he knew that he was designed to be able to do, but never reached before.  
  
That point was the very nature of his fighting ability, but he needed to train his mind before he truly reached it, it was something that was driving him, one of the few things he remembered, he did not know what it truly was, but it was what he knew was necessary for him.  
  
More foes came pouring at him as he touched ground with a smile more fitting on a demon than a being born of the earth. He was a terrifying sight to behold, deadly grace and a warrior's elegance, his eyes showed that fire as dozens fell; he was for that moment death incarnate.  
  
His blade paused in one foe as he released it to spin around in a full three hundred and sixty degree twirl, firing both of the lasers implanted in his palms before snatching the sword back from the throat of the demon he had first struck before it even realized it was cut, its head removed by the retrieval of the blade.  
  
Zero lashed out against the guards in a flip kick that shattered bones, jets triggering as he arced over a dozen more. He landed on a gate, powering up both lasers to full burst mode, hands glowing crimson and cackling with stored energy.  
  
"Death comes for you," he laughed as he fired the twin bursts that ripped through his foes like a hot knife through butter.  
  
The pale blue hedgehog cackled as he moved forwards like an avenging angel.  
  
"Who...who are you?" one of the crippled demons managed to say as he walked amidst the destruction he had caused.  
  
"Me?" he responded with a sadistic smile, "I am Zero, but you will know me as your death."  
  
A snap kick with the metal tipped boot shattered the demons skull.  
  
Then they rushed him, hundreds, more than he could hope to fight at once in his situation, it was at times like this when the machine took over completely, his primary purpose had been defined by the organic half in this situation, his life and limbs were fully under the heartless machine, lethal and wholly without mercy or remorse.  
  
A winged being joined the guardian, he was a dark haired humanoid with ravens wings spread behind him.  
  
"So your chosen was swept away when he changed the order of things," the winged one chuckled, "He had already done it once before, now he left three slayers in the world."  
  
"I see that you have chosen the cyborg to be your representative in the mess that is coming, though he could be considered to be mine as in a way he is the child of my own."  
  
"True, but he is also something else, his mission is different, he is capable of less than your chosen, but at the same time more," the winged one said softly, "His soul is similar to mine, a destroyer."  
  
"Yes, but he also has the potential to be a hero."  
  
"I know, it is what he is to be, a warrior for the light, for freedom."  
  
"You know, Fate and Destiny are already plotting against our chosen ones?"  
  
"Yes, after what yours did, it is inevitable, they are scared, his defeat of Janus was not something they had even considered."  
  
"Wasn't the prophecy stated about two with one blood, the child of chaos chosen by thunder and the living weapon by death, shall lead the world to a new age."  
  
"Yes, they have been watching multiple births for eons, and their work against clones, but then this happens, it makes me glad."  
  
"Our time in this world has left us weary in our time of watching the world go by, I shall almost be glad when it is over."  
  
"Yes, my old friend, the end is near, we only have to keep the others from destroying everything that showed the time where humanity would earn its freedom."  
  
"Your chosen seems to have gotten himself into a mess, hasn't he?"  
  
"Yes, and it is time that I intervened."  
  
"Yes, unlike you I am not bound by the rules of non interference, my orders dealing with Egypt saw to that."  
  
"Have you heard anything about my chosen then?"  
  
"No, his disappearing act as well as eliminating a hell dimension, has several of the others in an uproar, the gate keepers are freaking out especially, and he kind of shattered their control over the gates."  
  
"Even I managed to underestimate his power in that form then, I knew he could destabilize the portal, I did not see him destroying Acaltha or that dimension, nor his scrambling up the gateways."  
  
"You do know that this does make the path easier to follow, he will return eventually, that has the twins in full blown panic mode, they saw him returning even stronger than before."  
  
"And your chosen seems to be concealed from them, a wraith to their visions, they expected a far different path to be walked, and Janus' little pet changed the world, a little bit of chaos can change the world."  
  
"Yes, and its time to throw a little more chaos into the world, Zero is going to have some fun."  
  
"Definitely." 


	4. Whistler

AN: On Buffy's Earth, things are getting really heated up with two beings watching the whole affair, and Zero is being, well Zero and wreaking his own special brand of havoc upon the demonic population of LA. For those of you who don't know what this story is coming from, it's from the Anne plotline, can't remember which season, three I think, but I'm not sure at the moment.  
  
As for the guardian and his raven winged friend, their identities will eventually be revealed, but they're fun to write about, the pieces can be put together for one of them, but not the other. Janus was originally equal to them before he got his power lessened on Halloween and then stripped during the end of Overdrive. I'm playing around with a few of the characters and setting a few things up to effect more than just LA and Sunnydale in the base Earth in this, mainly through Zero's search for knowledge as to who he is.  
  
Also as a side note, if anyone would like to compile Overdrive into a PDF file for me, I'd be happy to send you the originals of it and put it on my site for anyone who wants to download it, I still can't figure out how to get FF.net to use the asterisk lines like I do when typing these out.  
  
His mind came to; memories flashed for a bare instant, the cybernetic systems inside of him bringing them to the forefront of his thoughts.  
  
Zero's automated defenses triggered next, sending nanobots to repair the damage to his tissue that was sensed. The sensors read damage all through his system, his mind playing back the fight he had given to his foes, most of them lay dead around him, but there were far too many to kill them all, or even disable them, he had been beaten after that and tossed into a cage to be used as a slave later, the mental modifications understood that, but it also was counting the seconds until he was back at full power, ready for another killing spree of the tormentors.  
  
His sensors were monitoring him, sensing something slowly changing within; his mind was far sharper, far more deadly and prepared for what was to come.  
  
His mind buzzed for a second, he sensed motion, but not the way he normally did, it was instantly identified, tracked and located precisely.  
  
"Who are you," he asked calmly, his mind assuring him that it was humanoid, but non-hostile.  
  
"Well, let's just say a few people up there really like you."  
  
"Up where, I am inside a cavern, in a pocket dimension off of Earth, infact, my sensors confirm the roof of the cavern as the roof of this chamber, there is no further up in here."  
  
"Erm, well...that's not quite what I meant."  
  
"Clarify."  
  
"Two gods are getting involved in your fate; one of them has pegged you as his choice to aid in the future and sent me to inform you that you're getting an upgrade of sorts."  
  
"Just great, more ways to deal with hostiles," Zero responded.  
  
"Tough crowd."  
  
"There isn't a crowd, only you and me, and who are you, and more importantly, what are you?"  
  
"I'm Whistler, and I'm supposed to be keeping the balance, or rather I'm supposed to play messenger for the people up there who are supposed to keep the balance, but after what happened last Halloween, one of them got rather cranky and all the gods went and started viewing it as a game of Survivor."  
  
"Define Survivor."  
  
"Erm, well, I won't go into that, but how the hell do you know I'm here, your eyes are closed."  
  
"I am a cyborg, I am equipped with sensors, and apparently the upgrades included them."  
  
"They didn't tell me that, what are you planning, I recognize that look in any creature..."  
  
Zero was up, on his feet now, collecting energy as the balance demon vanished to the same place he had come from, the only light in the cell came from the cyborgs glowing eyes and the energy he was preparing to use to shatter the doors.  
  
A smile that would have frozen hell crossed his lips and a cold chuckle escaped his throat as he prepared to cause what he viewed as an appropriate punishment for those who had nearly slain him.  
  
The killing machine that lay dormant even in his last battle came out to play, and hell itself would be amazed at the sheer number of "guests" it would have before his anger died down for his normal personality to reemerge.  
  
He cackled, a high pitched and frightening sound that had been designed to cause a panic in those he faced. With no effort he fired, turning the foot thick metal door into a crater that tore through the floor and roof as well as the walls around it, vaporization, not shattering, Zero was through playing.  
  
"Well, that certainly wasn't what I expected," the raven winged one muttered to himself as he watched the proceedings.  
  
"But it went well all things considered, although I would have liked some time to sell tickets to watch this conflagration when the triplets realize that their lawyers missed a cataclysm coming for one of their other operations in the City of 'Angels' and that it wasn't seen by the twins," Whistler said with a slight chuckle at what was coming.  
  
"Would you go and warn Lucy that most of the inhabitants of another dimension are about to need accommodations," the other said, leaning back as he slowly shook his head.  
  
"If he kills me for this, I'll haunt you for eternity," the balance demon said as he turned to leave, "I just hope he doesn't do to me what he did to the last messenger that got sent there, after Super Sonic blew up a hell dimension instantaneously, I wanted to claw my own eyes out after seeing that."  
  
"Even he would not dare to touch the messenger of another one of the number, that one was his own, and thus he could do as he wished."  
  
Whistler gulped loudly, but vanished to do his task.  
  
"Well at least this one is better than your last choice," the guardian said with a slight chuckle, "He doesn't have that spark of darkness within him, or a cursed soul, he may have a violent and sadistic mind, but he's on our side."  
  
"Yes, although Ares did have it out with me that he fit his requirements more than mine as Death."  
  
"He's still rather annoyed that my chosen managed to blow up a good portion of the leadership of the Watchers, their insistence that the line of his chosen was under their control, he started finding those with the possibility outside of those he normally would."  
  
"Ares still ended up with more than one, now he has three of those he empowered and a bunch of others he 'helps' from time to time."  
  
"Do you have any idea who they have in mind to replace Janus?"  
  
"With the order of Succession disturbed in two ways, Vaulk was to get it when Janus died or anything happened to remove his power, such as what did happen, but Sonic eliminated him as well, the others are running around like chickens with their heads chopped off, one of the more horrific suggestions was to adopt Glorificus into our number, thanks the Creator that that particular suggestion was canned, she was bad enough in her own dimension, even the triplets avoid her."  
  
"Most of us are still trying to find a way to eliminate that particular threat; the twins say that there is only a few years left before she finds where we have hidden the Key."  
  
"Then steps will have to be taken, has the Lord of Vengeance decided to stand with us on this, or against us?"  
  
"He has elected to remain neutral in this situation."  
  
"Good, at least his favorite pet isn't going to be mucking up the Hellmouth for a time,"  
  
"Anyanaka isn't someone to annoy, the power of a wish is something not to be underestimated."  
  
"True, but then again, she isn't much in fact, she preys on the weak and doesn't dare to seek larger prey, she learned that after her run it with the Paleontologist chick, she had no idea that Utahraptors would prefer demon flesh over human, that one was amusing."  
  
"But did you have to get Whistler to then deliver them to her in a box he liberated from a pet store?"  
  
"I was bored then."  
  
"That scared the heck out of all the messengers, a pack of hungry and irritated predators nearing sentience level with more sadism in them than your current chosen." 


	5. Devistation

AN: Sorry if that discussion went on a bit to long for your tastes, writing out the deities responses to the events is just as addictive as the rest of the story. And as FF.net is down as I'm working on this, well, I don't have something to yank me out of it, plus this way I get to have some fun with characters that weren't introduced yet at this point in the actual series. I could just imagine Anya as her demon self opening THAT sort of a gift and adding a fear other than bunnies to her. And its never a smart idea to listen to the ideas of people who know a lot about things that would make others wet their pants if you are trying to grant a vengeful wish. But as for who they are, I'm using them as the Powers That Be in this one, or at least a faction of them, who says that they can't have a sense of humor?

SPECIAL NOTE I now have a Yahoo group about this series its at so join it if you want, I'm trying a few things for the series that I'll put up there that can't show up here. It's adress is listed in my profile.

Hawkins- Thanks, I'm finishing this one before I finish Summer Vacation, its just one of those things where I can't help myself  
  
The first sign the demons had that something was wrong was not the blast that freed a hostile that took several hundred of their number to put down, nor was it the destruction of a large portion of their cells, nor was it when the room they were holding things they had taken from their slaves was broken into and the door flung like a Frisbee at those inside of it to eliminate them. No, it was when their armory blossomed into a fireball that took down their own barracks in a wash of flame and shrapnel.  
  
The machine was in control, and its protocols demanded total annialation of those who dared to injure him. The protocols his organic part had developed demanded that those imprisoned as he was were to be kept safe from the rampage, his machine half also assessed them as non threats.  
  
It was then, that the machine broke the rules that were set for mortal beings, that point he had been designed to reach, it had been blocked from mortals to prevent one from changing fate, but his mind centered upon it. He had reached it, attained the unattainable, his mind centered upon the Zero Point, and he attained through it, true precognition.  
  
What the seers said was precognition was not, visions show only a short glimpse into a possible future at a place to urge them into action to prevent it. Precognition is an entirely different animal, it shows the probable future around the one with it, in enough time that he can choose how to react to it, in the hands of a creature such as Zero, it made the destructive force he carried even more dangerous, he could aim for where they would be, where the shots would do the most damage, and he would know when and what attacks were coming. He had become a foe that was infinitely more deadly than he had been.  
  
The energy bursts shot from him far faster than his design had anticipated as its maximum potential, explosions tore through his foes as the shackles he had torn apart to allow movement were snapped entirely open imbedded in demon skulls. On the other hand, his recovered blade was moving slowly it seemed, precision based death, each blow killing at least one if not more. The killing machine within him had only begun to surface before, now the killer had risen, one that had truly become something far more dangerous, and it was not just that the machine was there now, it was that the feelings he had identified as anger and rage and indignation fueled it.  
  
Another part of it, a very small part was something within the blade, the part that allowed it to withstand the charmed Sword of Acorn was also beginning to awaken. The sword once known as Death Bringer among its incarnations through history millennia before one noble knight had used it to petrify Acaltha.  
  
He was for that time he had become something that the demons viewed as otherworldly, a force of nature, and their doom. He was remorseless, without pity nor mercy, without feeling, without regret, he had become their destruction embodied in flesh.  
  
Zero landed in the main chamber, the remains of the larger mechanical tools the demons were using collapsing all around him as the glowing, crimson eyes scanned his surroundings.  
  
Motion...scan...demon...hostile...terminate....motion...scan...demon...non- hostile...safe...motion...scan...human...non- hostile...safe...motion...scan...demon... hostile...terminate...  
  
His mind was tracking everything, the simple commands triggering making him an awesome sight amidst the energy bursts, explosions, and flames that erupted around him as the demons tried in vain to avoid the slaughter caused by the rampaging cyborg.  
  
One charged him with a whip, only to lose nearly everything but his limbs with a burst of energy. Others attacked with the tools they had forced their slaves to use, but only faced the same fate as the whip wielder.  
  
A swarm of them charged him, hundreds, nearly a thousand of them more than he could fight, but his mind identified an easy alternative.  
  
He combined the fire of both palm lasers and aimed upwards, tearing loose a large section of the roof, collapsing it on his foes. Thousands of tons crashing down like a waterfall, superheated to the melting point.  
  
Then something happened that the cold and analytical machine couldn't figure out a response to, one of the demons, the last one alive, had taken a hostage.  
  
The light in the cyborgs eyes dimmed and vanished, replaced with the pale blue hedgehog's normal eyes, it was up to him to end this situation.  
  
"I think I'm gonna hurl," Whistler commented as he sat besides the two gods, asked to observe.  
  
"Okay, I underestimated his abilities, I shouldn't have enhanced them, but what can I do now?" the black winged one managed to say.  
  
"It's not your fault, we can't predict his machine half, we weren't prepared for anything to be that close to breaking that rule."  
  
"They're gonna kill me," Whistler muttered to himself, "I'm doomed!"  
  
"No, they won't mess with you, they'll try to mess with me and I never really signed that treaty."  
  
"You are one tricky pain in the rear aren't you boss."  
  
"Yeah, sometimes warfare is best fought through guile and deception rather than an outwards show of force, but even I am rather shocked at my new chosen."  
  
"Its unreal, that kid can cause more damage than any of the others I think, is he the one you're preparing to deal with the hell goddess?"  
  
"No, but it is a possibility, currently that job lies with the chosen of Ares."


	6. Shatter Point

AN: This is one of the last two chapters of Zero Point, for the timeline, this story ends by the time Xander/Sonic leaves the Artemis Fowl world when you compare it to Summer Vacation. One thing I'm considering as a side story would be Janus and Snyder in the sanitarium common room or whatever it is where they get to sit and watch TV or whatever its called, it would be an amusing chapter though, just for a laugh and it might actually be worth writing.  
  
"You do realize that she is the only thing keeping you alive right now?" Zero asked with a tone of voice that would have given penguins goose bumps.  
  
"And if I let go I still die," the demon commented, "Your play."  
  
His mind was trying to identify why this creature looked familiar, but his memory was running through all of the possibilities it could identify, but finding none. Then it started the more comprehensive search.  
  
"Oh, one thing that you may not have realized is that I am not only what I seem to be, I am a cyborg, and I have an infinite amount of patience for you to make a mistake."  
  
The pale blue hedgehog identified them, but at first it seemed impossible, the enemy was the creature he had known as 'Ken' was before him, but 'Ken' was missing his limbs and blown apart with a grenade.  
  
"I doubt that," the demon said as he started to retreat to the portal out, but it was then that the monster made his mistake, his arm came up and out from behind the teenage girl he was using as a hostage.  
  
He decided that since the creature was wearing a disguise it was the reason, to hide discontinuity in the outside world.  
  
Zero was on him in a heartbeat, grabbing the arm and shattering the elbow to force the hand free. He drove a boot into it from the side, sending it clear of its former hostage and into a pile of debris.  
  
His sensors turned to the girl for a moment, and he spotted a different set of readings then he had expected. The scans not matching the baseline for any human he had encountered in his travels, even the ones who inhabited the bar he had found himself in.  
  
"What are you?" he asked calmly, the scans not reading her as one of those he had exterminated, "You're projecting a different energy spectrum, are you a..." his memory files recalling and finding the information he required...'Bracken?"  
  
"How...how did you know?" she stuttered, holding back tears.  
  
"Lorne one of you went missing and asked if I could help look," he responded, "He had also heard of other vanishings in the area, so I came and checked the place out."  
  
"Thanks..." she started.  
  
"Don't mention it," his mind sensing something about her, it urged him to protect her, she just seemed to young for it, even if his internal sensors only registered him as a maximum of two weeks old.  
  
She just nodded as he heard something and reacted, sensors identifying it as the demon he had just sent flying.  
  
"Run, get everyone out," he said slowly, his mind feeling that there was something about to go bad, worse than he had expected.  
  
"What about you?"  
  
"Doesn't matter," he responded, the calm filling him again, "Get them out as quickly as you can!"  
  
She dashed off to start getting people out as the hedgehog and the slaver stared each other down.  
  
Zero considered just blasting him, but then the world started shaking, unbalancing him.  
  
"What the hell?" he muttered.  
  
"It's already happening," the demon chuckled, blood pouring from injuries across his face and the disguise he had been wearing one identical to 'Ken' was ripped to shreds.  
  
"What have you done?" the cyborgs voice portrayed the casual and collected violence he was known for by those in Caritas.  
  
"Oh, just did something closest equated to setting the dimension to self destruct."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Because, even if I die, I still get my revenge."  
  
"That doesn't make sense, you still die either way, you aren't completing a mission goal, just committing suicide," the cyborg commented as he launched himself forwards, lifting the demon into the air by his throat, "How do I stop it?"  
  
"You can't, it's the spell that made this place that's dissolving," the demon cackled, "You're too late, too bad, so sad."  
  
Zero snapped the creature's neck and tossed him away like a piece of trash as his mind finished assimilating the data he gained from the pathetic creature.  
  
For a brief moment, he knew that his if his mission was only able to be completed by sacrificing himself, he would do it, that was the nature of his machine half, but his organic half would fight to survive. What the demon had done was incomprehensible to him, so he devoted a small part of his mind to uncovering the reasons behind it, the why.  
  
Then he reacted to the imminent threat the dimension collapsing had created, he was the needed. His current mission would fail if he did not do all that he could to get people out of this nightmare. He was the only one who could do the job of keeping them all safe until they could escape; it was what he felt as if he had been designed to do.  
  
It took him a mere moment to reach the gateway, his machine half scanning it and searching through possibilities to help as he saw the teenage Bracken helping by boosting people out.  
  
He nodded to her before triggering his thrusters to go search for anyone who needed his help in getting out and keeping the pathways to the gate clear. From any of the rubble.  
  
It took hours before he couldn't read any more life in the dimension other than the Bracken and himself. Everyone had made it out, well, everyone who wasn't trying to enslave those who did.  
  
"Holy!" Whistler stammered as the balance demon fell out of his chair, "How the hell did he pull that one off?"  
  
"That one is a surprise to us all," the guardian responded as he saw the raven winged one checking his watch.  
  
"Uh, boss, what are you waiting on?"  
  
"Lucy ought to be arriving in 5...4..." the winged one answered.  
  
"And I'm leaving to avoid the crossfire," Whistler chuckled vanishing.  
  
"...3...2...1...And here comes the psycho of the hour!"  
  
And the Lucifer appeared in a pillar of flames, "Azrael, do you know what your chosen just did!"  
  
It would have been impressive if the dark lords robes hadn't caught fire, or if he hadn't gone prancing about to put it out, or even if he hadn't ended up falling and crashing through the chair the balance demon had vanished from only seconds earlier. 


	7. Aftermath

AN: This is it, the closing chapter of Zero Point, once more the action is pretty much over, just an ending. Then it's back to work on Summer Vacation, I'm sorry to keep you waiting for an update on that, but this story just trapped me into writing more and more of it, even other ideas for the same time period. I just happen to like Zero, he's amusing to write. Also at the group, there is an exclusive story up there to enjoy about Janus and Snyder and what's going on with them, if enough people comment on it there, I may put it up here as well.  
  
Zero stood their on the roof of Caritas, he was just watching the city. It was calming to him and well, Lorne forced him out of the bar due to his second fight there, one horned creature pinned to the ceiling by his own horns and spikes, alive, but definitely not in a good mood.  
  
He leaned back against the AC and forced his body to relax. His mind went back to how he felt getting the girl back to her family, something that made him feel happy for some strange reason.  
  
"Are you just going to stand there or are you here for a reason?" he asked as his sensors detected Whistler on the other side of the machine.  
  
The balance demon shrugged and stepped into view.  
  
"You know, I still have no idea how you knew I was there."  
  
"I detected the distortion in the air pressure when you arrived, a simple and automatic sweep of the area located you, then that data was compared to the data in memory, you're the only one that fits that look and power signature."  
  
"Power signature?" the pimp dressed one asked.  
  
"So far every type of creature that I have encountered gives off energy at a slightly different frequency, ergo an identification method for known species, and..." the cyborg responded with a creepily pleased smile, "...One group I think I may have just brought to extinction."  
  
"Yeah, you did, the triplets aren't to happy about that one."  
  
"Triplets?"  
  
"Yeah, Wolf, Ram and Hart, those three seem to get their fun by planning bouts of various disorder, and that little dimension was one of their pet projects, you got it totally destroyed, one of the few mortals to be responsible for the destruction of a dimension."  
  
"Yes, it was most comparable to the feeling of pleasure until the last of them decided that it would be best to set the self destruct system."  
  
"True, you did cause a slaughter, I'm still trying to understand how you did half of what you did, and even my boss says that he underestimated you."  
  
"I don't understand why he would have estimated my abilities in the first place."  
  
"Well, before you became who you are now, he saw what you could do, and then you didn't go into that mindset to kill all of your foes like you did in that pocket dimension."  
  
"That could be considered an new high, I reached the point one of my recovered memory files told me that I was designed to reach, but I do not know why it was as it was."  
  
"That point was not meant for mortals, nor any gods for that matter, anyway, my boss got chewed out by several groups for your little playtime down below, and I have orders to bring you to the Oracles, in other words the twins avatars."  
  
"Twins?"  
  
"Their names are Fate and Destiny, and well... I really don't get near Destiny, but if he's anything like Fate, well lets just say that the saying is one hundred percent correct."  
  
"What saying?"  
  
"Fate's a real bitch."  
  
"She's a female dog?"  
  
Whistler just groaned.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Why do I have the feeling that it's just one of those days?"  
  
"Well, I believe that the first move in LA has been made, but has my knight taken a pawn or something larger?" Azrael asked the guardian.  
  
"Of this I am not sure, the triplets are, as usual, hiding behind layers and layers of deceptions," his friend answered, "What did the twins want with him?"  
  
"Well, they wanted help, someone who would have been important if Janus hadn't decided to mix things up, was dumped into one of the triplets worlds, they want her retrieved, and it was either that or try to take the power back."  
  
"Yes, that wouldn't have ended well, and what allies do the triplets have in this?"  
  
"Not many, and even they are standing back, currently only Lucy is actively helping them and he didn't notice that dimension other than to prepare a place for those from it in their eternal torment."  
  
"So he has a chance then to pull this off, luckily the Gate Watchers and the twins were the only ones to see what happened in that dimension other than us, and the twins have a use for your chosen."  
  
"Lets hope my chosen can survive this test." 


End file.
